Mansion owners rush to avoid charges

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Wealthy property owners are urgently seeking to untangle the company
structures they used to buy multimillion-pound homes before they are hit
with an annual charge that could run to many thousands of pounds.

After the Budget in March, the Government brought in new top-rate stamp duty
bands, with homes worth more than £2 million taxed at 7 per cent and
residential properties of the same value bought by a company taxed at 15 per
cent.

The top-rate stamp duty band was introduced to discourage people from buying
property within a company, after which future buyers could take over the
shares